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Redskins face possible boycott from religious group

Heat on Washington's NFL club will be turned up once again Saturday when a regional conference of the United Church of Christ votes on a resolution to boycott games and paraphernalia unless the club changes its embattled team name.

Heat on Washington's NFL club will be turned up once again Saturday when a regional conference of the United Church of Christ votes on a resolution to boycott games and paraphernalia unless the club changes its embattled team name.

The UCC's Central Atlantic Conference is expected to pass the resolution, which could ultimately be brought to the church's national governing body. The UCC has more than 5,000 congregations and roughly 1 million members nationwide.

The Rev. Graylan Hagler of Plymouth Congregational United Church of Christ in Washington has been speaking out against the team name for more than 20 years, including at a Smithsonian symposium last year.

"One should not second-guess, and play all types of word games, and try to dance around the subject and make something that is racist, not racist," Hagler said then. "Or make something that is disparaging, not disparaging. The reality is the reality: A person looks you in the eye and says, 'I'm offended,' then therefore we should regard their truth as truth."

The potential boycott by a religious group comes after several other recent developments, including letters to NFL commissioner Roger Goodell castigating the team name signed by half of the U.S. Senate and an anti-team-name TV ad that played in eight major markets during the NBA Finals. The team hired a D.C. lobbying firm in the days after the Senate letter.